Poetry | Bauble | Mary Ann Schaefer

Bauble
It is just a thing, really:
	an ornament dangling
from a hook, a trinket
	conceived from

molten quartz that found
	its shape in the Nile
Valley where sun gods
	and hieroglyphs persist,

a small and smooth
	glass orb, clear
mostly, but don’t look
	away, focus close:

the bulb dimples
	all around like
tiny trumpet bells
	tinted in that pale

color of wild columbines,
	the nodding puckered
flowers that can woo
	long-tongued wings

hungry for nectar.  Is it
	summer then or winter
coming?  Do evergreens always
	blink and bow; 

does snow forever
	suspend light?  How can 
stillness so pronounced 
	be echoing black
	
bear dreams?  Really, such 
	a useless thing, this
whatnot, a simple and 
	likely breakable spell

that I want you to have.